Problem is that for the good features of raidz (incredible integrity even under crash / hdd malfunction and no RAID5 loophole) i need to supply them as raw devices to the guest solaris OS so they can be seen as they would be is solaris was being installed directly on the HW.

I have seen some posts and information about people that were able to use HDDs as raw devices directly on the Guest OS under ESX3 and ESX3.5 but instructions were not clear and information was not much and none of it was about ESXi4.

Does anyone know how to supply SATA HDDs was RAW DEVICES to a VM's guest OS? Any help would be greatly appreciated!

Thanks in advance,

Mario

Sun Sep 20, 2009 8:58 am

Dave.Mishchenko

Site Admin

Joined: Mon Mar 16, 2009 10:13 pmPosts: 3880

Re: Supplying Local SATA HDDs as RAW Devices to VM Guest OS

With a SCSI disk you can add a generic SCSI device to a VM, but this does not work wth SATA.

What sort of controller do you have? If you MB supported Intel Directed I/O, you could add another controller and then add the controller directly into the VM to access the drives.

I believe so, as the controller is an Intel ICH10R. However it is currently configured for AHCI mode as i have no interest in enabling the fake RAID mode.I checked the Intel® I/O Controller Hub 10 (ICH10) Family Datasheet and:

When you mean adding another controller, you mean a virtual controller, right? I am not very familiar with ESXi, i use server at work.

It would be great if you could give me some more pointers...

Thanks in advance!

Mario

Sun Sep 20, 2009 12:50 pm

mariojjsimoes

Joined: Sun Sep 20, 2009 7:14 amPosts: 5

Re: Supplying Local SATA HDDs as RAW Devices to VM Guest OS

Hurrah!

Did it - just testing it somewhat but it appears to work perfectly!Will post the solution in detail so that whoever wants to do it won't have to take so long as i did.

Mario

Wed Sep 23, 2009 3:05 pm

Dave.Mishchenko

Site Admin

Joined: Mon Mar 16, 2009 10:13 pmPosts: 3880

Re: Supplying Local SATA HDDs as RAW Devices to VM Guest OS

Glad to hear it worked out. I'd be interested to see some screen shots (you can email them to davem at agresso.com if you don't mind). I had just put together an article on USB devices and vmdirectpath http://www.vm-help.com/esx40i/VMDirectP ... _Setup.php and the setup you have would be worth a full write up as well.

I replaced the HDDs serial numbers for SERIALN1, SERIALN2, etc as i don't want my hdd serial numbers floating around the internet...

This will create what i think are passtrough vmdk files, wich then only have to be added to the vsphere client.

Because it may (or not, i don't know) help me to later identify an eventually failed hdd i try to add the serial number of the hdds to as much related things as i can, hence host_zpool_hdd1_SERIALN1.vmdk

Also, for each vmdk file a -rdm.vmdk is creaated. I don't know why...

Doing ls -la under /vmfs/devices/datastore1/ZFS_Host_Opensolaris should

Now, all that needs to be done is go to the Vsphere client and in the machine properties for the VM and:

Go to the VM properties, add new hardware, select disk, select "use an existing virtual disk", select one of the new vmdk files you should see there (Pic1) and repeat for any other hdds.

Pic2 and Pic3 shows the final result.

I have tested it and if i create zpools and zfs filesystems on those disks and put data on them, from the VM, and then shutdown ESXi and boot from opensolaris live cd, the zpool are detected, and the data in the zfs filesystem accessible.

This exactly what i needed as i will be able to use all the advantages of ZFS and raidz, especially the fact that it is transactional and thus avoids the RAID-5 loophole. This means that, for instance, under a powerout situation, and no UPS, the data will be safe, even if ESXi or the Solaris VM gets corrupted as the advantages are not lost by having another abstraction layer (in the case ZFS was created inside a virtual HDD) and data will always be available out of ESXi via a simple reboot.

Also, the datastore for the other VMs will be an exported iscsi target zfs volume, but i haven't got there yet.

Please feel free to publish this where you like, and bellow i will add the links that got me on the right track after many, many hours of trying to find a solution.I will send you this same text with the pictures to your e-mail.

I am preparing a full document, as i go, that will explain everything from the ESXi install to the solaris set-up, etc.When i do i will foward it to you, if you are interested in hosting it, as i don't have where to. The only thing i ask, as with this, is that my name is on it.

Also, a final note, i am quite convinced, after a lot of digging that this is either not possible or very dificult under XEN Server.

Umm, I followed this thread from VMDirectPath white list page[1]because I tought it would be possible to passthru an integrated/onboard SATA controller. But after I read Mario's posts I think whathe did was not using VMDirectPath+VT-d but RDM. I believeit is still possible to passthru the Intel ICH10 SATA controller, butcould someone correct/verify this for me?

Oh, forgot to add that Asus P5Q3[0] mainboard uses Intel P45 chipsetwhich is by itself, according to this page[1], doesn't have Intel VT-dcapability. The ICH10 southbridge supports VT-d, but not with the P45 northbridge.

I think the host ended up on that list in error. I would also check the BIOS manual for the MB as in some cases a chipset may support VT-d but if the MB manufacturer hasn't provided the option in the BIOS then you would be out of luck.

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